ABSTRACT
Spain remained staunchly Catholic and monastic and mysticism flourished as sixteenth-century Spain swarmed with mystics of every variety, from the most sublime mystics who sought the union of the soul in Spiritual Marriage to those given to receiving visions, voices and prophecies. The mystical literature that was produced in such profusion in the sixteenth century was to a great degree the foundation of the Golden Age of Spanish Literature, but at the same time the widespread mystical movements attracted the unwelcome attention of the newly-established Spanish Inquisition, keen to sniff out all aberrations from orthodox Christianity.
